Getting Started

As supporters of effective school improvement planning processes, it is our belief that it is important to establish a foundational understanding regarding the “why” of school improvement; participants in the process must understand the vision and the mission behind their own building’s process—and ultimately how it directly aids the students they serve. Therefore, we’d encourage you to avoid jumping straight to the “requirements” of the process and begin with your purpose, ask the group Why? There is an excellent video resource below to start the conversation. Furthermore, before digging into the reports or even the data for that matter, most people need to have a connection with the process. The "Meet a New Student" activity is a great connector that will later frame virtually everything we do throughout this site, providing a framework for a practical school improvement process. NEW to LearnPort is an online Moodle course that provides an overview of School Improvement and even incorporates the "Start with Why" video featured below.Click here to learn how to access.

​Start with WHY (Mission, Vision, Beliefs)

The video below is of Simon Sinek's TED Talk on "How great leaders inspire action."

The first six minutes will provide an ideal overview that great organizations start with why rather than what. These first six minutes may be all you need to start a conversation regarding your beliefs, vision, and/or mission. The basic question that should be discussed is: Why are you involved in education? Then continue by asking How do you accomplish your purpose? What are the visible results?

You may wish to incorporate more than the first six minutes of the video into your activator; minutes 6-8 discusses the biology of the brain, 8-11 belief versus product (Wright brothers example), 11-13 Marketing Bell Curve, minutes 13-17 more examples, and 17-18 concluding remarks.

Before Gathering & Studying Data ...

Create a discussion around how we support an individual student through an activity such as "Meet a New Student" with slides on the right correspond to the numbers below (Podcast Available):

1. Introduce Devyn (slide 1), then give pairs or small groups a few minutes to brainstorm a list of information that they would want for an incoming student.2. Quickly have each group give one item and move to the next group. As each group gives their chosen item, point out and/or ask them which of the four categories the data they chose would fit (4 types on slide 2).3. Display slide 3 with some sample data and raise the question, what other information might you want to know about his reading ability?

The key response centers around the need to drill down to more timely and diagnostic data.

4. Slide 4: Now that we have defined the reading problem for an incoming students, who should we communicate with next and what are the next steps? Be specific. Participants will most likely describe connecting with multiple stakeholders and developing a plan for intervention (slide 5). (School Improvement should involve multiple stakeholders that develop a plan based on a defined problem using researched based strategies).5. The parent of this child would certainly want more than a plan, they would want assurances of action, or in educational language, implementation with fidelity (slide 6).6. The key questions throughout the improvement process are "Is what we are doing working to improve teaching and learning?" and "How do we know?" This is a natural transition to both checking progress and evaluating the intervention (slide 7). 7. Notice how the cycle repeats itself when there is still a problem in reading ... re-define the problem and adjust the plan, implement, and monitor progress. What works for the individual ... works for the system (slide 7)!8. Looking at the cycle, we can begin to see the overlap based on the definitions of "Define the problem," "Plan," "Implement," and "Monitor" with the MDE larger cycle of "Gather, Study, Plan, Do" (slide 8). 9. Shows the MDE School Improvement Cycle with virtually the same four steps aligned to the corresponding reports that are required throughout the year (slide 9) .10. The graphic for the Practical School Improvement Timelines illustrates how the cycle for addressing student improvement (Define, Plan, Implement, Monitor) occurs frequently (every 4-6 weeks) and at the building or systems level (Gather, Study, Plan, Do) occurs throughout the calendar year (slide 10).